TNReady’s new testing company also owns the old one

Stephen Lazer (far right), who formerly worked for Educational Testing Service and is now the CEO of Questar, appears before a Tennessee legislative hearing last fall with Education Commissioner Candice McQueen to discuss scoring problems with the state's 2017 TNReady exam under Questar. ETS owns Questar and is now stepping in to oversee TNReady's design, while Questar will continue to administer the exam this fall.

Tennessee’s decision to bring aboard a second testing group to work through headaches with its problem-plagued assessment keeps the job within the same family.

Education Commissioner Candice McQueen announced Monday that Educational Testing Service, also known as ETS, will take over design work for TNReady to allow Questar, the exam’s current overseer, to focus on administering the test.

While McQueen described ETS as a “different vendor,” the group actually owns Questar.

The New Jersey-based nonprofit organization purchased Minnesota-based Questar in 2017 for $127.5 million to serve as its for-profit arm. Questar CEO Stephen Lazer came from ETS, where he was senior vice president over student and teacher assessments.

ETS is a big player in the testing world. The group designs and administers more than 50 million tests per year in 180 countries, and its assessments include the Nation’s Report Card given through the U.S. Department of Education’s National Assessment of Educational Progress.

McQueen said ETS has a good track record in Tennessee for creating its social studies and science tests, as well as its teacher certification exams. She said the state has received no complaints about testing directions developed by ETS, while it’s received numerous complaints about directions developed by Questar for TNReady math and language arts assessments.

“They are sophisticated in their content development,” McQueen said of ETS, noting that the group also has a larger staff and management structure than Questar.

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State spokeswoman Sara Gast said Tuesday the testing groups “had no relationship at all” when the state Department of Education entered into its first contracts with ETS in 2015 and then with Questar to take over TNReady in 2016.

“ETS acquired Questar last year, but Questar has remained a separate legal entity, and we have two separate contracts and they are two separate companies,” Gast said.

The state plans to amend its contract with ETS to add TNReady design work and is negotiating with Questar about its $30 million-a-year contract. McQueen did not offer specifics about either, but any changes must be approved by the legislature’s fiscal review committee.

Questar’s two-year contract ends Nov. 30, and the state either will stick with the company or find its third testing vendor in four years. The state fired North Carolina-based Measurement Inc. in 2016 after TNReady’s failed online rollout prompted McQueen to cancel most TNReady exams that year.

PHOTO: Marta W. Aldrich

Gov. Bill Haslam and his education chief, Candice McQueen, speak with reporters Monday about how Tennessee will handle standardized test results this year because of technical problems administering the exams by computer.

McQueen said this week that Questar fell short in responding to testing problems this spring. And in an interview last week with Chalkbeat, she said several days of outages for the computerized test appear to have stemmed from decisions made by Questar employees who did not consult with the state.

One was caused by an overnight software upgrade in Minnesota that hampered logins for Tennessee high school students on April 25. The other involved a computerized text-to-speech feature for students needing audible instructions. Questar disabled the feature after determining it was preventing students statewide from logging in and submitting their exams on April 30.

McQueen said the state is reviewing the second matter.

“We have a belief that Questar potentially made a change from what they did with text-to-speech in the fall to what we experienced in the spring. And that was … not an approved change from the department,” she said.“Our contract is very clear that if any change is made, it has to be approved through the department.”